Luiza Nunes and James Lewis wrote a nice article back in 2020 called “How to manage a program in a product-mode organization”. Quick summary “Product-mode” companies are set up such that there is less coordination required across teams/areas; However, there will still be cross-area programs that do require coordination; Key patterns: invest…

“too much WIP” means too many things being worked on at the same time WIP refers to “work-in-process”, that is how many things are being processed or worked on at the same time. “Too much WIP” refers to having too many tasks / Stories / Initiatives / Bets being worked on at the same time. This applies at the individual, team, department, and company-level. “too much WIP” is a problem because it makes things take longer

Some individual and team productivity practices also translate to the organizational level Organisational productivity has factors that overlap with both team productivity and individual productivity: Increasing focus; Frequent customer feedback; Reducing friction; Watching the work product, not the workers; Frequent integration However, organisational productivity goes beyond just a translation of individual and team productivity practices:

Initial assessment: Blink Estimation I got a group of really smart people in a room, with at least 10 years’ experience each, and asked them. Dan North, “Blink Estimation” For initial assessment of whether something is worth attempting at all OR to choose between different options, I prefer Blink Estimation, aka project-scale Planning Poker. Key points …

Any distributed social system will inevitably have conflicts that need resolution. That is, when you have a bunch of different people and teams working on a shared goal, you will inevitably have disagreements that need some way of being resolved. Single-leader Any disagreement goes to a single leader to resolve. Ensures…